Using DirecTivo over Vonage (VoIP) - a solution

Good luck. I have the Directv brand with TIVo (one of the newer ones with a 250meg hard drive) and vonage. It was a nightmare on with vonage and directv technical assistance. Finally after tons of other things that didn't work -- the external modem work perfectly. I got an old modem and had a computer guy program it to some of the specs on this forum and it worked once I used a TIVO number out of New York. If you can't get anything else to work go to the "weakknees" site and buy their external modem set up. Do a search for "weakknees and tivo" and it should come up. Its a modem and a special cord all configured. I think it costs $69. Its worth the money if all else fails. You might want to e-mail them with your unit info and get their 2 cents before you buy. Now, your unit doesn't seem to be the same as mine so you may need to search this forum for someone talking about your unit or someone will ultimately answer with more knowledge than me. Here are some preliminary must try items:

1. Go on your Vonage website and account and make sure your call quality is on 99bps. You should see on your Vonage website dashboard a link for call quality and be sure to set it to the 99 setting for the best call quality.

2. If you can tell the TIVo unit what phone number to try for the TIVO call, try using a New York City TIVO number (even my external modem only worked with a New York number). Apparently the New York numbers are closer to some vonage switch and the call quality can be better for the call. Some other people on this forum may be able to give you better detail. On my unit you have to put the new number in the dialing prefix spaces on the call set up screen. Anyway some of the New York numbers are 212-920-3005 or 212-202-9705 or 212-277-3895. The cost shouldn't be a factor cause vonage long distance is part of the vonage package.

I talked to Vonage today and finally got my **** connected. They gave me 3: 28.8 kb/s servers to connect to as well as the tivo supplied ,#034 command. According to Tivo ,#034 will turn down the connection speed to 28.8 kb/s on any TivO (also DirecTiVo) (,#064 in some cases) and using these servers will actually make it work. Use and one of these 3 "long distance" servers (don't matter if its free) to connect, set up your dial in number as: 212-277-3895; 212-920-3005; 212-271-7103 ( with ,#034 as dial prefix), or for those of you who cant currently connect do this:

They also say disable phone avail detection and tone detection, but i them both on and it works just fine. It will fail occasional. (also if you set your dial in number as one of the numbers listed and its doesn't work, try it using as listed in example above, your connection may still be trying to transmit to fast.) (Damn Complicated TiVo)

Also in a chat I had with a TiVo Hardware Enginere in charge of "Connectivity" , Internet and other "Voip" related Issues I Inquired about the Voip connection issued and weather they were planning on introducing the use of the USB ports on the back TiVo's for nearly 85% DirecTv Audience for use of USB NIC's and the possibility of connecting through the internet for the daily call. And he said its not in planning in the near future. They still want to know that the satellite is at "home base." So it looks like weary connections for Direct Tv users with Tivo For a while to come.

I tried your settings and was unable to connect. However, I was able to tweak your settings slightly and voila -- it completed the call. This surprised the heck out of me since I've been trying variations of these settings for months with no luck.

Hey, I just went from 0% success in DTV over vonage since April 2005, to 100% after doing two things, one FREE, and one costing $40.00 (note: since april, I have tried so many # codes, call-waiting prefixes, area codes, and such that my wife was ready to slap me. I was addicted to the codes, man I haunted the lists, and tried new ones every day, and new combos too.)

$40  went to compusa and got a WRTP54G to replace the PAP2 and WRT54G  after rebates, total coast is $40, plus I can take the PAP2 with me now to remote locations, and have internet phone when I travel to Europe or Mexico. This one brought my successful call rate from 0% to about 70% (and gave me a nice nite-light in the living room  those blue indicator lights are bright, man. Plus, its much neater there now that I only have one box.)

Free: swapping my cable modem from the old DOCSIS 1.1 Motorola 4200 to a newer DOCSIS 2.0 modem  Time Warner just swapped it  it told them it dropped connections occaisionally. This brought my success rate from about 70% to %100 ( I never tried this with my old PAP2 and WRT54G combination, but I suspect it would have given me pretty good results).

Reasoning:
Latency and packet loss are our enemies. There is a huge difference between data over analof lines and over digital. On an old POTS line (Plain Old Telephone Service), it could get pretty noisy, but since the connection was always open once established, there was virtually NO latency. On my data connection, I was running an average of 120ms delay, up to 1200ms. Fine for modern packet-oriented data connections that automatically resend dropped packets, and can re-order packets that arrive out of order, but traditional modems expect all packets to arrive in order, and that they will not be delayed in getting there. Modern packet communications are much more fault-tolerant when considered as a whole system, but when you put analog modems over a digital connection, odd things can happen if there is latency or packet loss.

DOCSIS 2.0 has much greater capability in both upstream and downstream dataflow - the pipline is much bigger. The WRTP54G has the Qos built in, so the Vonage traffic gets higher priority (I had it set for high priority in the WRT54G, but it never seemed to make a difference.)

The two things I did above were designed to minimize latency, but I also see an improvement in my packet loss as well.

YMMV, but I firmly believe that what we need to do to fix this is minimize latency and packet loss. All of the codes, slowing down modems, etc., are designed to make the analog modem system more tolerant.

I have tried almost everything to be able to make a call, including various codes (not a techie here) found on the internet.

I last used a 50' phone cable to connect the telephone adaptor to the DVR, and got an error message of 'call failed' or 'line busy'.

HELP! Do I need to buy a modem? Upgrade? What can I do?

Thanks for any assistance,
Dish

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How does your computer figure into this? You need a phoneline. DTivo cannot easily connect via direct broadband, though some claim it can with additional hardware. The DVR seems to be looking for a dialtone. I have no problem using Vonage as my phoneline, but I suppose Voicewing might be different.

How does your computer figure into this? You need a phoneline. DTivo cannot easily connect via direct broadband, though some claim it can with additional hardware. The DVR seems to be looking for a dialtone. I have no problem using Vonage as my phoneline, but I suppose Voicewing might be different.

don't you need a broadband connection to get vonage? i have dsl for my computer internet. i don't have cable modem or cable tv. and i'm not a techie, so i don't think i'll have much luck playing with the settings.

I have HR10-250 and I have optimum voice (cablevision's phone service).

I connected a south bell wireless jack since the phone is far away and running cables will only cause problems.

According to one personell at cablevision DVR doesnt work with their phone service but at first they told me it did. They told me I need to change something in the DVR to 14.4 kbps. I dont know how to do that.

Has anyone been able to set it up with optimum voice with cablevision or time warner cable.

Thanks

PS just spoke DTV and they dont know what they are doing. The last person i spoke with told me they activated the access card for a HD receiver not a HD DVR. I spoke to 4 different people and no one notice this after speaking them that someone made a mistake.

I have HR10-250 and I have optimum voice (cablevision's phone service).

I connected a south bell wireless jack since the phone is far away and running cables will only cause problems.

According to one personell at cablevision DVR doesnt work with their phone service but at first they told me it did. They told me I need to change something in the DVR to 14.4 kbps. I dont know how to do that.

Has anyone been able to set it up with optimum voice with cablevision or time warner cable.

Thanks

PS just spoke DTV and they dont know what they are doing. The last person i spoke with told me they activated the access card for a HD receiver not a HD DVR. I spoke to 4 different people and no one notice this after speaking them that someone made a mistake.

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Just a note my success is from is using Vonage...but the commands down below slow down your internal modems speed on the DirecTV unit...the phone numbers are DirecTV/TiVo based so give them a shot as well.

If you check out the prior Post from Devlin85 he found this information out from Tivo Support

Devlin85 said:

According to Tivo ,#034 will turn down the connection speed to 28.8 kb/s on any TiVo (also DirecTiVo) (,#064 in some cases)

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You may want to try this command and/or call Tivo (since the HD unit is TiVo based) directly to see if can be slowed down even further to 14.4kbps.

I ended up using a combination between posts from Devlin85 and Chilli_Dog and this is what my configuration looks like and works at:

In addition to the above I did install a DSL Filter on the line (mentioned early on in this thread as an option) since I had one laying around from my last house (cable now ). In addition I moved the quality setting all the way up to high. I am going to slowley move this down until I start getting failures and then leave at the lowest possible that works.

I don't think the length of the cord could have that much effect on it. The jack I use is easily over 50' from the Vonage adaptor. One of your settings is putting the VOIP line into a busy signal.

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The *99 code cause some Vonage adapters (such as the MOTO 2442) to get a busy signal.
I just did extensive tests with both my HR10-250's and the following works for me:
dial prefix 2122773895
call wait prefix ,#034

There is a lot of great information here! Unfortunately I am not sure it will help me in my situation. I have a Directv DVR R10 tivo unit. My Broadband Connection Is a Hughes Net DW7000 Satelite set up. As of this moment I don't have VOIP but I would love to have it If I knew it would work with my set up. Saying goodbye to my phone company would save me around $50.00 a month. According to Hughes net VOIP might work but with a slight delay. Is there anyone out there familiar with such a setup that combines VOIP, Directv Tivo, and a Sat. broadband connection?

There is a lot of great information here! Unfortunately I am not sure it will help me in my situation. I have a Directv DVR R10 tivo unit. My Broadband Connection Is a Hughes Net DW7000 Satelite set up. As of this moment I don't have VOIP but I would love to have it If I knew it would work with my set up. Saying goodbye to my phone company would save me around $50.00 a month. According to Hughes net VOIP might work but with a slight delay. Is there anyone out there familiar with such a setup that combines VOIP, Directv Tivo, and a Sat. broadband connection?

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I am not sure about any VoIP company other than Vonage, since it is the one I use, (over cable) but you have a 30 day trial that comes with it. You may want to call them directly and see what they have to say? If you do attempt the 30 day trial, ask first if you get the set up fee returned should you cancel before the trial is up. other wise the set up is close to $25. And should you decide to port your home number over to can it be reveresed should you cancel.

I did pull this statement off the ASK Vonage site

Does Vonage service work with my DSL Satellite Internet connection?

Yes, our service generally works with DSL Satellite Internet connections or any Point-to-Point Protocol over Ethernet (PPPoE) device (i.e., your home router). DSL requires Point-to-Point Protocol over Ethernet (PPPoE) authentication ("username & password") to access the Internet so you will have to configure your Vonageadapter or home router for this service.

There may be some latency inherent on a satellite connection or line of sight issues that could affect audio quality when making calls through the Vonage service. Our calls require 90 kbps of consistent upload/download speed to make and receive calls through the Vonagenetwork.

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Just remember you will have to adjust your DTiVo settings until it connects should you decide to go with Vonage or any other VoIP.

I've managed to get this working... sorta... and I wanted to tell people my experience with it, and maybe see if anyone has any advice.

I have an HDVR2, so my only solution is to use the external modem as described. I bought a one from ebay (28.8 US Robotics FAX modem). Tested the modem on a PC first. It worked just fine. I built the 1/8" headphone to DB25 cable that he described, basically exactly the same as he described. I happened to have a RJ45 to DB25 dongle. I wired it exactly as described, carefully noting which DB25 pins mapped to which RJ45 pins. I cut off 4 of the unused pins inside the DB25 dongle, stripped the ends and wrapped them together to make the cross connects on pins 4&5 and 6&20. I took an unused CAT5 cable and cut off about 12" on one end. I then took the wires on the CAT5 cable that were associated with the DB25 pins 2, 3, & 7 and stripped them.

At first I used an old pair of headphones as RedGrey did. But for some reason I couldn't get this to work. The headphones worked before I cut off the end, but as soon as I did, I'd lose continuity. The headphone cables, as one would expect, had a signal and a ground cable within them. The problem seemed to be that they were in too close proximity to each other and when I cut the cable it was just way too easy for them to contact each other. So I went to RatShack and bought one of their unwired connectors. I made sure to get the Rat Shack folks carefully point out to me which of the three leads on these things were tip, ring and base. I then soldered my stripped cat5 wires to each of those ends, and Voila. The DTiVo was able to make as many successful test calls as I wanted.

But! That's not the end of the story.

Right now it appears that my DTiVo is trying to download 3.1.1b upgrade. And this is a problem. When I use vonage, I occasionally get echos on the line. The modem does NOT like that. It starts to download, and then invariably, the RX light will eventually stop blinking. Then eventually, the modem will hangup the phone (probably initiated from the other end) and then eventually the DTiVo will give a status of "Failed. Call interrupted". Sometimes I can get the download to go for 40 minutes. Other times it will only go for 5 mins. But it always ends exactly the same way.

The end result of this is that, even though I'm able to complete a successful test call, because I haven't completed a successful "daily call" I'm still getting the NAG screens saying that I haven't succesfully completed a call since the ice age. (That's a slight embellishment on my part.)

I'm thinking of taking my tivo over to a friend's house with a regular phone line and using it just to complete the download. I think once I get past the download it won't be that big of a deal. But it would seem that Vonage does not have good enough sound quality for a 28.8 modem to download a DTiVo software update. I'm sure that it's good enough for much shorter calls.

I'm thinking of trying to force the modem to a slower speed to see if I can get it to work. Any other ideas as to what I might try?

The other question I have is will I eventually download the entire update piece by piece, or does the entire software update have to come through in a single phone call?

Edit: Added NAG screen info

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Hey i think i know why it didnt do well, just b/c i had a experiance this once.. One time when my vacum sucked up the wires of my $80 dj headsets and i had to fix the wire.. There are two ways to prep the wire inorder to have a headset wire have a conituity you can connect it to a circuit board or wires with soldier if you play with soldier buy some rosin it makes the job 10x eaiser.. I used a solider gun (i used 100-1000w) and burn away the clear coat on the wire then dip the wire in soldier rosin and put soldier on it and your done.. Or you can do the getto way and use a razor and scratch the clear coat .. the key is to get the clear coat off the wires to have conituity hopes this helps your project...

I wouldn't even think of trying VoIP with Sat broadband, especially if it only saves you $5.00 a month.

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I do not understand that at all.

I'm on Vonage's 500 minute plan and it costs me like $15 a month, plus I have a virtual number that family can call to avoid toll charges and that's $5.

Verizon keeps trying to lure me back but can't even come close. Like $40 - $60 for comparable service and I'd still lose some features like email notification of calls and simultaneous ringing of my home & cell.

Now DSL would be a lot cheaper, but since I'm too far down the line I can't get DSL. But for me I wouldn't think of NOT having Vonage. My sat receivers don't mind one bit, nor does Tivo. Of course the broadband connection is much better for Tivo.

I have Vonage and use the Motorola VT2442 ATA. I had to do a Clear and Delete after one of the DirecTiVos (HDVR2) encountered a hardware error, which forced me to do a Guided Setup and phone connections. I used the VT2442, and it connected two calls out of four and finished the Guided Setup.

So, it appears that the VT2442 works 50% of the time with ZERO changes (one call was an 800 number and other call was local number, and each failed once).

I'm on Vonage's 500 minute plan and it costs me like $15 a month, plus I have a virtual number that family can call to avoid toll charges and that's $5.

Verizon keeps trying to lure me back but can't even come close. Like $40 - $60 for comparable service and I'd still lose some features like email notification of calls and simultaneous ringing of my home & cell.

Now DSL would be a lot cheaper, but since I'm too far down the line I can't get DSL. But for me I wouldn't think of NOT having Vonage. My sat receivers don't mind one bit, nor does Tivo. Of course the broadband connection is much better for Tivo.

What kills me about the Bells is they unoffically support bill cramming. At mom's, twice in 3 months they added roughly $15 in 3rd party charges that she never requested and they wanted her to contact the party and have them remove it claiming they (SBC/ ATT) were "not allowed" to remove the charge. I raised cain over it and they removed the 1st one and assured me they put blocks on her account so it would never happen again. Yet 3 months later they did it again - same company, different supposed service. Again I raised cain and eventually they removed it too. But who needs the grief? They wouldn't remove these charges until I contacted every regulatory agency I could think of.

Why? you may ask, would a Bell be so resistant to removing such charges? Because they rake in a lot of money from such erroneous billings just for collecting your money to pay these scum bags. And according to my internet search of the biller it appears to have actually been related to Sprint!

Then 2 months ago my sister accepted a LOCAL collect call lasting about 8 minutes from a payphone. They charged over $15!

I could add more examples but there's no escaping the fact that with Vonage you are MUCH safer from phone billing scams.